Fear Is Not Simple
by skywalker05
Summary: Our Master addressed you; "Lord Vader, this is Darth Maul. You have seen each other before, I believe." Sidious's lined face stretched to a smile. "Maul will serve as your lieutenant." You watched me and thought buried thoughts.
1. Postlog

_Fear Is Not Simple: a fanfic_

"But name? I have none, for I am not name but function: deed, not word."

Michael H. Payne

_The Blood Jaguar _

Postlog

I stand here on the first lonely landscape of my life.

Enough–! Where did this place begin? I retrace _myself _like a prey animal.

Did my life begin it? No. My training has not pointed to exile, but service...!

Did that fool Jedi apprentice begin it, when arrogance made time speed up and his lightsaber reached to my primary heart so that I too thought I was dead, lying beside than manmade pit?

No. That began a new era, the lesser exile...!

Enough–! That fault redirected my anger only slightly. For that later time I believed Lord Sidious did right in aiding me to live, in changing my work from action to his purpose, years-long patience. Ten years and we do not change much, Zabrak or Sith.

I believe it began at the end of the waiting, when plans I had heard audibly nothing of in a galaxy that changed brought _you _to Coruscant with us. Sidious had focus for you. He told me only that you had lowered much of the population of the Jedi Temple. Whatever this was meant to do, it made me envy you, and hate you.

_There _it began, then...

So as I search for hope on this barren world, I will count your crimes against me.


	2. Event 1

I

I smelled injury in the new halls of our Master's legally constructed medical center. I smelled your burning. Lord Sidious stood at the doorway and stared in the door of that room that held enough light for droids only. I could sense your _turmoil_, and your power, as it struggled in solitary existence under the pain. So distracted, our Master told me that the Padawan who had defeated me (–!) also flung you into lava-heat. And you, the child he protected that first day! Though now_ he_ was one of few; and you were supposed to be the Jedi's pinnacle, instead of him. Now their pinnacle is so low. Ah!

I looked in to that strangely lit room for a while, and tired of it. I dared to ask our Master if you were my replacement.

"This is a new era," He said. "A new sort of hand is needed. Let us see where the streams of destiny flow, now that they are in my hands!"

I sensed a menace he allowed to leak out, as if with a look he carefully berated a child.

**I **heard/felt the upheaval at your awakening. I thought you feeble, tossed about by spare emotion, corrupted loyalty, and that thing termed love. Now I sensed your power with a purpose–and desired to set myself against it, if only to die. Physically you were as healed as you ever will be, with your breath forever out of control. Lord Sidious began to coach you in a new worldview and in the commanding of mundane armies, while I perfected _ancient _techniques.


	3. Event 2

II

Perhaps the "Imperial" officers were getting used to men in full black cloaks traversing their spacelanes. I gloried in our Emperor's success, at our finally _owning_.

Politely skittish, the human crew ferried me to you. Why all human, I wondered?

Lord Sidious introduced us in an otherwise unimportant hallway. Your irritating breathing beat like a rhythm. Not a centimeter of skin showed on this column you had become, this ebony durasteel mind that still remained--perhaps you too were kept alive beyond your purpose. So I held some hope, and looked up at you wondering how best to break metal articulated like limbs, as I had with the Confederacy pawn Grievous. I had been knowledgeable about his history, but never was permitted to fight him. I begged silently now that it would be vice-versa with you, Darth Vader.

Our Master addressed _you_; "Lord Vader, this is Darth Maul. You have seen each other before, I believe." Sidious's lined face stretched to a smile. "Maul will serve as your lieutenant; he is strong in the Force."

You watched me and thought complicated, buried thoughts.

"Be attentive," was all he said to me, and when he walked back toward the shuttle I locked eyes with you, and then took a few steps to catch up to our Master.

"Permit me to ask _why_, my Master."

He did not look at me. "This is not your mission, Maul; it is Lord Vader's, as is the _new galaxy_. You should be either successful or dead since long ago."

What a strange fact to be told.


	4. Event 3

Event III

I prowled back to where you had turned to leave but hesitated, listening in whatever untrustworthy way you still could.

"You must realize you function as an _attack dog_," you said slowly.

"I was parley to the scheming of the Sith before you first used the Force to steal candy. Where is _your _place that the Empire is suddenly your military might?" I surprised myself with this release.

A bit of joy oozed from you and your thick-gloved hands fisted. "The Emperor recognizes in me the skills required for conquest of space and spacecraft and of politicians. You do not know these." You _gloated. _You turned away with an escort of officers, and added as I fell into step with them feeling lacking indeed, feeling used--! "The time for the opinions of non-humans is over."

"What does the Emperor have against non-humans?"

You were silent, and battered like a clumsy tank as I attempted to seek into your mind. I slipped around, attacked--and an olive suited man poked a rifle mouth against my chest on your casually waved command. You let me kill him to retain their respect for we black-cloaked men, but held up another adamantine mental guard.

I resolved not to remain on this leash. Perhaps, finally, Sidious was testing me again.

**V**ader and Maul hunted together sometimes. On Nkllor you spoke of the new government to a rapt audience of townspeople while I leapt from the dust and broke a curious/impatient Padawan's neck. When I returned with her blonde braid and blood to cross the 'wanted' poster surely they did see me as an akk dog returning to its shadowy Korun trainer.

Would you even recognize that reference?

I had wondered why your Empire cultivated this anti-"alien" view. Yes, Yoda was, physiologically, an absolute mystery, and Mace Windu, though human, adhered to his deviant Korun culture. I am equipped to deal with deviance, even my own. Perhaps those now seen as key players, yourself and Palpatine, Kenobi and the rogue politicians, all being human?

My Master had not emerged from vague duties to heed my questions.


	5. Event 4

IV

I let my lightsaber boil up close enough to my face that the metallic smell became a blood-taste in my mouth and my eyes changed--blindness. Good for seeing the force in this dustless subterranean maze.

I must admit, Vader, that your vehemence surprised me when I came looking for an exploitation of your traumas. I was still so unused to feelings of minutist disloyalty toward our emperor. Your wordless reaction backed me into this maze where we both knew who had the advantage in a tangle of narrow spaces I do not know. One can get used to a starship the size of the Dagoban floodplains--but not in three days.

At first our lightsabers contacted constantly, rapidly. My single blade fought for space in the pathway possibly meant only for droids to repair the Star Destroyer, while your style matched your build--massive power, slow decision, flawless defense.

I have been created to destroy that which is flawless.

You never knew the power of such conviction. I stretch out as --block, strike, twist, turn and strike and slide--and touch with the Force the cramped hallways behind us. They must open up into something, some useable machine construct--I scored a touch on your faceplate and then you stabbed forward. With my left hand I seized your right where it pushed your lightsaber toward me, and pressed into the padded metal--it was too well constructed to break, but only creaked and thickened under my nails. I threw myself out of that danger into a connecting hallway. You loomed in the hallway and said nothing because or in spite of that echoing breathing. You could be sleeping, you vaping humanspawned usurper monstrosity--!

I caught a high blow that almost threatened the muscle of my arms. Our environment had changed. Long room, computer terminals. I matched your steps back and back into this and kept dodging into these slow blows that covered every inch of the hallway in a tanklike sweep--I threw myself into the air over your head, finally slid my hands down to flip the switch for my second blade, and landed on your other side. Stuck the tip of my second blade into your side under the armpit, playing, and whipped my second blade over the top to catch your predictable strike. I crumpled the ceiling into darkside sculpture that tore out and fell--

around you, not on to you, playing no more, and you've sidestepped me into another corner like a sandpanther crouching against a dune. Prickles of fear did not dare to touch my skin, but my slid away from you against the wall had no finesse, no attack, in it. I jogged backwards away from you, down this hall--

You sent the ceiling down around me. Jagged dark gray bits lashed across my face and your anger turned the place into a boiler room, emotion-smoke clogging all that is cognizant, releasing like a spent blaster fouling smoke into the stale air.

You had never used everything before, had you? All that emotion and rage inside you for a battle? You never had. I snarled and whirlwinded with my lightsabers, blemishing further the structure around me. A klaxon began beeping, louder and louder like something to rouse a sleeper.

You, like one of your prized gigantic spacecraft, walked through the destruction and ignored its raining. Simple tricks or facts. I jolted forward, was met with another falling skein of metal, jolted forward. You shouted as your lightsaber came down and--now its brute power did push my weapon out of my hands and under the floor.

It is hard for me to remember this. The moment was too feral--but I continue to have revenge on the memories, and with that view anything can be achieved.

I caught your arm again on the next falling strike and kicked into your faceplate. Dented that canine visage? I think so. It served for nothing, and my footing was lost. I fell among the metal and buried lightsaber, one hand digging for the latter, mind reaching out, not to find but to _see_ you move your own scarlet blade vertical almost down my back. I let that touch get close enough to remember my loyalties, the pain I endured by Sidious' hand, and secured my lightsaber's haft, tensed everything, twisted up at you again inside the line of your offbalanced finishing strike--my hands dug into the control surfaces at your stomach and I remembered that Sidious did not desire my winning this fight.

Remembered? No, or only somehow. _Knew. _Knew that somewhere he was cackling at both of us, fighting like chype roosters.

I slashed a Z into your sparking carapace, and flipped away. Something unexpected tore across one of my horns on the ceiling, and I licked the blood when it slithered down.

I did not know what to tell you then.

You kept coming.

I slipped aside from each strike as you pushed me down the corridor, the klaxons beating with our boots on the reflective floor.

In a few steps your Force power reached for my throat, but I had learned quite a while ago how not to breathe, and as you worked turned your anger back upon you and lashed in your brain like a dragon.

I gave you fight for the last steps. Never have I wanted anything less than to retreat here. Know that, Vader, and fear in your metal cocoon in space-night. But our lightsabers touched only rarely, and crackled, and I pushed you a meter across the widening passageway when we reached the bank of escape pods. I flipped the trigger to the first and stepped inside, and you barreled toward me.

I snarled and cursed in Iridonian.

The hatch closed--maybe you shouted something with words in it.

**I** know exactly how far you followed me, Vader. I almost know the expression on that officer's face as the tracking screen went black. Did you kill him instead of me?

Pity if you did. His was only a human life, and apart from that brief in the Force.

**I **pressed my saber-burn against the uncomfortable walls and hated you as the pod fell down toward this disreputable planet.

I have not yet decided to hate Sidious. He will show his face to me soon enough.


	6. Revenge 1

V

I lay in the doorway of that shiny escape-pod for a time, keeping my temperature away from that of the golden sand, staring into the sky.

Not all of this planet is desert, and not all of this planet is purely Imperial, so you do not have any reason to stay long. I sense the tangling impossibility of hyperspace when your ships pull out.

Lord Sidious had wanted me to work with you. And what? There is something stronger than my devotion to him?

Is the inherent anger of the dark side stronger than that devotion?

I do not want to think about that, so instead return to my last order.

"_Maul will serve as your lieutenant..This is not your mission, Maul. You should have been either successful or dead long ago."_

Now, my only purpose seems to be the defeat of Darth Vader. Will this prove enough?

No...further learning could.

You said, "_The Emperor recognizes in me the skills required for conquest of space and spacecraft and of politicians. You do not know these."_

Have I not listened to the Clone Wars? And I do not need to waste time talking when Lord Sidious is still doing that for me.

Then he knows these things, and I am worthless.

I have been taught to eliminate that which is worthless. I pull my lightsaber and set the nearest activation plate against the under side of my jaw.

The rattle of an exploding stun grenade arcs high over the escape pod. Already it is trailing gas, and another follows. And a frag grenade, shoving the escape pod's near wall against my back, forcing my up into a seated position as I hear the other side's ceramic and metal shattering.

My lightsaber slips from my hand. Presences in the distance quickly rush closer, on speederbikes or something, and I cannot change this fate. I am frozen by the multiple, unpredictably launched attacks.

I curse whomever this is and imagine ways to creatively behead them.

As the stun grenades lull me into their second stage, I hear voices.

"Got 'em!"

"What are the Imps doing, throwing out pods right now? During peace talks?"

"Just one pod. Shh."

A shadow ripples over me. I blink and am so ready to fall asleep. Not to be off-guard, never... but to be unknowing..."Whoah, man. Look at this barve..."


	7. Revenge 2

VII

Motivation is the crux?

I _know _that I could have defeated the soporific gases in the grenades. I had no reason to!

I had no reason to or not to defeat myself!

I wake up in a gray temporary room. All semi-military--corrugated walls, a flimsy bunk, a humanoid on a metal stool staring at me, a sleepy-looking Wookiee standing beside him. A varicolored woven blanket has been thrown over most of my body, and none of my possessions have been moved. Only my lightsaber is lying across the room attached to the blue pooling contents of a glop grenade.

The soldier across the room is an elderly male with a DL-44 clenched in one hand across his lap. The Rebellion crest stitched in clashing colors in his arm possibly indicates that he does not often see combat. Weak enough. For the Wookiee, pressure points will be very useful.

I sit up, resisting a growl that vibrated down my throat. The old soldier switches his gun up at me.

He says, "There is a ring of trip mines around this building. If you escape us, you will die."

They do not underestimate me.

"We've wasted resources because we don't know what you are, barve. My name is Jasper. Are you an enemy of the faceless Imperial scum, or just a fancier version of 'em?"

It feels uncomfortable to act without command, in ways. It feels like the failure of balance, which is an old memory from a turbulent time.

I looked at the Rebel and evaluate how this capture may be the perfect opportunity. "I am Darth Vader's foe." Realize how true that is, and fear.

He does not believe me. "Why did you fall from the Star Destroyed?"

I give him as much as he needs, no more--so I must think about dampening the complications around _you_. Pride beats the specific events out of my closest ordering thoughts. "I wished to avoid Vader, without other notice." I wonder whether they analyzed my wounds at all. They would not tell of a single rough landing. "Set me up against an enemy. I will show your allies willingness."

"I'd like to set you up with a minder. But this'll be enough for a first report. Good day,"

The two turned and left.

Give me a minder. I almost laughed. The psychic Black Sun agent had been a particularly enjoyable death, especially because I hadn't known I could do that without trying.

I sit, conserve energy, and direct my hatred toward you, Vader. Maybe even toward Sidious.


	8. Revenge 3

VIII

They return a short time later with food in cubes and a set of binders. I consume the cubes and let the rebels secure my hands. They lead me out into an autumn under two bluish suns. The gray prefab buildings stand behind the brown-barked trees with their hot-color revelry; there are a lot of buildings, and a large space-courier sits beyond those to my initial left.

I understand enough Wookkieespeak, but not most of what Jaster's companions says. He translates with a handheld computer. "The Alliance does not discriminate against any species or profession. It does require a standard to exist... We fight not for gain counted in lives or wealth. We aim to free the enslaved,"--A growl rattled up through the Wookiee's white teeth-- "to teach the immoral, to make fear useless. Do you too desire these things?"  
"Yes," I lie.

I want to be set against Darth Vader and his mechano-military crutches. Sidious will be proud when I kill his pet Anakin, though neither of you expected it--and if not, I will fight my way out of the heirarchy.

It is so dangerous, yet so comfortable.

(Yes, Vader. I know your name. I learned much while you burned. I will use your fear so well.)

The rebels do not entirely believe my curt answer, but their plammed destination does not change. It is a prefab no different from the others, except all the windows are covered with blue cloth.

The owner of this place exudes powerful calm, without power in the Force. Jaster's mind stops twitching toward his blaster like a hand.

Jaster opens the door onto a sitting room with camp chairs, a holoproj, and woven rugs on the metal floor. He says, "Mon Mothma is our commander--not just of this base." He looks at me with narrow blue eyes. "She'll wnat to know where you've come from. With detail."

I nod and step inside, within the guard of this respected person.

She enters the room and the only thing which surprises me is the disgusted experession which flashfloods across her face when she looks at me.

I am clothed to the skin in foreboding, as it should be, and she musters the bravery to recognize that.

Strong. I mindtrick her, subtly, to remove her prejudice against the Dark.

**T**here are, just as the Empire advertises, mercenary and "lowlife" individuals among the Rebels. No one in the pilots' barracks bothers me. though my only solitude is meditation. I told the group leaders that I couly fly any of their fighters because I am a former Imperial tester. I have studied enough, can avoid damage easily, and do not plan on staying behind the rebels' lines for very long.

Only you, Vader, and perhaps Lord Sidious know my target.

And I want to see you scared, knowing expression burn clearly through the black mask.

**I **throw the X-Wing toward the open bay. Shrapnel and lasers scream by and are ignored. The Force keeps me from shredding up until the door-clamps are thick around my fighter and the screaming battle outside is swallowed up by the silent stadium of a huge silver hanger.

You are standing there, on a stairwell, directing TIE pilots toward the few ships left on the rack to my left.

I sent the X-Wing in too fast. The nose touches the perfectly shining floor, rips, flips, shreds, spins the rest of this ship so that I am pressed against it, watching the line of where you stand as it orbits around me, my teeth clenched. Screeching metal and dusty smoke. To my right, now fore, the laser canon on my right wing snaps off against the balcony near yours and flips across the floor trailing wire guts.

Finally the tearing stops, the ship slows. I _ready_. The TIE pilots have drawn blasters, approached, shot. It is such a _full_ scene...!

I throw the dented canopy off of the X-Wing. With the Force it slams against the three pilots who had approached closer, down to the floor. Their scent is easy to ignore. I plant a foot on the rim of the cockpit and leap toward the stairwell. My lightsaber comes up, adding more smell and taste of alloy and teras kasi balance. ---! I tumble and the blaster bolts dance meters from my Force-awareness.

The flips land me standing inches from you.

The shooting stops.

That expression I wanted--rips across your tortured Force-awareness.


	9. Ceasation

**A/N: **_to the readers, I hope you've enjoyed this. This is the last chapter. I can't write from Maul's POV for too long without getting angsty, you know? lol_

_There is moral in this ending if you wish to find it, or so I have tried to make. Couldn't just have the story be about sw33t Sith, could I.--hmm...But the moral is that the dark side isn't worth it, I think._

XIX

You fling the Force up at me. I deflect the _push _with a gesture from my tight fist, pointing behind me. Balance still perfect. _Anger so perfect! _Your soldiers and equipment shatter on the desk.

When I but touch the platform you stand on, we've obliterated striking distance. Your breathing and the sounds of the lightsabers almost cover the clatter from beyond the duel. Fencing, raging, giving no ground!

You do not have reason enough to hate (only to defend) and you stand tall, comfortably immobile in your metal body.

I angle and whip the lower of my lightsabers' blades into your side. With the resistance I want to smell the circuitry--no. You've blocked. You lift and cut for my core. I've got my other blade over to catch it and I kicked out into your control panel in before you _think _to retreat. Now there is a satisfying _crunch_. At the apex of the snap you shuffle backwards, laser blade held across your chest, steam rising from your side. You _limp_, Darth Vader.

I leap toward you. I _smile_.

Red blades clash. None of my spinning attacks get through, but I'm pushing you back into and through a hallway. The Force under propulsion by my raving powerful emotions worms into what you're going to do next--nownownow--

Your voice booms, "You are dead!"

Your saber slams down and I've already slipped aside. Your mask-lens eyes track. "He killed you."

And suddenly you're angry enough. Loss--whatever you missed in that memory--stampedes through you as danger and intensity and ferocity.

Your blade slides across my neck and shoulder as I. I handspring, lightsaber always whirling, a few meters down the corridor and come for you again. Force energy smashes around me like dragon's wings beating at my head. I crouch and snarl, driven to the edge of the hanger. The soldiers are wary now, but ready. The juggernaut Vader bares toward me. Steam twists.

The dark side leads me to rise and stab through your defense. Your saber pushes mine against the wall. I jump to kick your face.

Again you _push_. I am concentrating on the physical, my hands and legs--so the Force grips and hurls me out into the hanger. I tuck into a roll and hit the floor smooth. No, falter--my back crashes against the tile. I recover on hands and feet.

Crouching there in the uniform of your enemy I stare up and hate you. You're impressively derelict, Vader. The stormtroopers are focused against and I don't care. Too awash in wrath! I stand and push my lightsaber active. I jog into an angle to trap you against the wall. Everything looks so alive in the fight! Your breathing sweeps over us. Red flares in the back of my mind, and it is only the dark side. _Intent! _I lunge into a flawless, Force-timed stab to feed plasma to _your _heart, traitor-!

A white-hot finger, a blaster bolt, tucks itself under my ribs. Another, from the far corner, into my shoulder. Sniper?!

I turn a stumble into a step toward him with the fuel of the dark side. Block the next step and explode it back --

and there are pinpricks at my back, thousands of bites.

I am falling.

I am looking at you from the floor and you have turned away, impressed and uncaring.

Before I...

The Emperor Palpatine peered through the gray and blue smoke at the tattered body clothed in unfamiliar orange and eternally familiar shrouding black spread on the Star Destroyer's parade ground. Blasters from pilots, stormtroopers, and antiaircraft emplacements had shredded through it.

Without the apprentice (caring for) turning to the Force's prescience, beforehand.

Sidious wondered, _It took all that to kill him. Excellent._

_But whatever did he think he was fighting for?_


End file.
